Red Deer Rut 30th September 2007

A sunny and mild evening. Highlights were Red Deer, Fallow Deer and a Hobby.

21 of us met at Ober Corner car park and set out towards the large heathy glade where the Red Deer normally rut. The rutting refers to the stags as they call ( a bellow, a bit like a cow) and fight off any rival males. Robins were singing as we walked through the wooded area and as we came out into the open Swallows were flying overhead.
We walked along the min path through the area, but no deer were visible. Then we saw a pair of antlers sticking up above the heather on the left hand side ahead of us. A Red Deer stag with 12 points to his antlers. We walked a bit further to get a better view and he stood up. A couple of hinds were visible in the heather next to him. As we watched he did bellow a few times, but we could only just hear it as the wind was blowing his sound away from us.
Some deer were sighted way ahead on the right hand side. A few Fallow Deer and 3 others. After a while we could see that they were 3 more Red Deer, a young male and 2 females. Back to the ’12 pointer’. He had sat down again now, but someone noticed a younger stag coming out of the woods and slowly walking towards him. What would happen? Surely he wouldn’t challenge the much bigger 12 pointer! He got closer and the 12 pointer stood up. There was no real challenge – the younger stag ran off with the 12 pointer running half-heartedly after him! That was about as much action as we would see tonight.
We met a Forestry Ranger who told us that there have been many more Red Deer here in previous years, but numbers of people watching have increased and not all of them are sensible. It is important to keep to the paths and not walk towards the deer or they will get scared off and this is what he felt had happened.
We walked away from the deer to see if we could see anything else. We stopped by some bushes where we could hear Long-tailed Tits and they soon came into view. We walked back to the stag and saw a group of Fallow Deer run across the heath and into the woods headed by a white one!
All the time that we had been watching a few Meadow Pipits flew around and one or two Stonechats were seen atop Gorse bushes. As we turned to go a bird of prey flew over – Hobby. A pretty good view before it disappeared over the trees.
Simon Curson